Should I use " European Union's " or "European Union"?

Question

Here are my constructions:

As I said, I am present in territory of the European Union's , therefore, please contact me only via e-mail at [email address].

As I said, I am present in territory of the European Union, therefore, please contact me only via e-mail at [email address].

So my question is, should I use 'the European Union's' or 'the European Union'?

possible duplicate of What is the use of using preposition 'of' to talk about possessions with *ANIMATE* countable nouns?. Also Why say “of x's” instead of “of x”? — FumbleFingers, Nov 03 '14 at 14:12
"I am present in territory of the European Union" is not grammatically correct (or at least, not the usual way of saying it). Making it "...in the territory..." would make it correct, but still unusual. "I am [currently] in the EU" would be how I'd expect most native speakers to say it. — Tim S., Nov 03 '14 at 14:22

score 4 · Accepted Answer · edited Nov 03 '14 at 16:13

Apostrophe ('s) talks about possession. Looking at your sentence, I don't think you mean that. Check out two sentences to clear whether to use it or not.

This is the territory of the European Union

And...

This is ‎‎the European Union's territory

Broadly, when you use '...of the...', it won't take apostrophe. Because you already said that possession.

However, there's something called double genitive/possessive, that uses 'of...'s' constructions. Merriam-Webster describes it.

a syntactic construction in English in which possession is marked both by the preposition of and a noun or pronoun in the possessive case (as in “A friend of Bob's is a friend of mine”) —called also double possessive.

[But again, to stay unambiguous, I'd prefer to avoid this usage].

Good read here.

It's called (by some) "double genitive". Check out the tag I've added to the post of Heniek's. (0: — CowperKettle, Nov 03 '14 at 11:03
@CopperKettle Hey, I think it'll be useful to include this. Thanks — Maulik V, Nov 03 '14 at 11:51

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 03 '14 at 11:42

Compare:

(?)That is the book of Peter.
(*)That is the Peter's book.
That is Peter's book.
(?)That is the book of Peter's.
(*)That is a book of Peter.
(*) That is a Peter's book.
That is a book of Peter's.

We normally use the 's structure, rather than of when we talk about possessions, relationships and physical characteristic, especially when the 'possessor' noun refers to a person, animal or to a country, organisation or other group of creatures [see Swan (2005.440), Practical English Usage]. That is why sentence 3 is natural and sentences 1 and 5 are not. However when the 'possessor' noun is not a person but one of the other types mentioned, both the of and the 's constructions are possible: The President of Russia and Russia's President.

We cannot usually put a possessive between another determiner and a noun. Instead, we use a structure with of + possessive (Swan p.443). Sentences 2 and 6 are therefore incorrect English. Sentence 7 is natural. The definite article defines its noun, and sentence 4 is therefore unnatural, though That is the book of Peter's that I was talking about is acceptable, as the definite article defines one of several of Peter's books.

So, That is the territory of Canada/ the European Union/the United Kingdom and That is Canada's/ the European's Union's/The United Kingdom's territory are possible as is That is Canadian/European Union/United Kingdom territory. In that last sentence, 'European Union' and 'United Kingdom' function adjectivally.

Should I use " European Union's " or "European Union"?

2 Answers2